Leading nav and geo experts convene in San Jose

19 October 2009, 10:23am

Oct 19, 2009 - TheWhereBusiness will hold its annual Navigation & Location conference on December 1st - 2nd at the Crowne Plaza in San Jose. Now in its sixth year, the event brings together the top players representing car, PND and mobile OEMs, navigation and location-based service providers, geo-content providers and wireless carriers.

Speakers include senior executives from TomTom, Gartner, iSuppli, Telenav, Pandora, Ford, Forum Nokia America, Cloudmade, Networks in Motion, POI Friends, Trimble Outdoor and Yelp.

To request a PDF brochure with full information, click the link below.

This year's event will focus equally on each navigation platform with the sole aim of unearthing new ways to monetise navigation-based services. As we see turn-by-turn navigation devices pushed down the value chain, traditional navigation players must look more closely at innovative location-based services to generate new revenues.

According to Egil Juliussen, principal analyst for iSuppli who will be speaking on the morning of day two, the market for apps has emerged as a central battlefront in the global technology industry.

"Device manufacturers, wireless service providers and software developers are fighting it out for a share of this fast-growing market," says Juliussen. "The global automotive industry has entered an exciting phase, with OEMs, suppliers and software developers all pushing innovative and unique approaches to add apps to cars. Whichever way the automakers go, mobile apps are going to become more readily available in the vehicle."

Jessica Steel, senior vice president of business development at Pandora, says that 55% of Pandora's smartphone listeners take their mobile devices into the vehicle to enjoy their personalised Pandora stations, instead of tuning into traditional radio or their iPods.

"Our goal is to integrate the controls for our mobile applications into the vehicle itself to make Pandora a seamless entertainment experience in the car," says Steel, who will join representatives from Forum Nokia America, Voicebox and Arbitron on the panel that will examine the evolution of in-car connected services at the Navigation & Location event.

Following the panel discussion, Lewis Mowatt from Nuance will make a presentation on using speech as a service enabler. Mowatt says that while customers are excited about the wide range of location-based services available to them in their vehicles, they can be daunted by their complexity.

"New innovations in speech technologies and graphical user interfaces will make these services safer and easier to use opening up functionality to the customer and revenue streams to the industry," says Mowatt.

With nearly 200 expected to attend the event, Navigation and Location 2009 promises to be a key networking forum for geo and navigation experts.

Follow the link below to learn more about the conference, the topics and the confirmed speakers.

For more information about this event, e-mail Helen Raff, or phone +44 207 375 7582.

PDF brochure

Navigation and Location 2009 information

Geo: International